BOOK VI.--Now has arisen the great temptation of Sordello. Is it to be the

Great Renunciation or the Fall? With the magnificent prospect before him of Chief of the Ghibellines, the Emperor cause; with the Emperor's badge on his neck; with Palma, his Ghibelline bride, he, Taurello Salinguerra's son, might at last do something! After all, what was the difference between Guelf and Ghibelline? Why should he give up all the joy of life that the multitude might have some joy? "Speed their Then." "But how this badge would suffer!--you improve your Now!" So Sordello lovingly eyes the tempter's apple. After all, evil is just as natural as good; and without evil no good can accrue to men. Sordello may then as well be happy while he may. Soul and body have each alike need of the other: soul must content itself without the Infinite till the earth-stage is over. He has tried to satisfy the soul's longing, and has failed: why not seek now the common joys of men? Salinguerra and Palma reach the chamber door and dash aside the veil, only to find Sordello dead, "under his foot the badge." Has he lost or won? He learned how to live as he came to die: he made the Great Renunciation, and in seeming defeat he achieved his soul's success.

NOTES TO BOOK I.--Line 6, _Pentapolin_, "o' the naked arm," king of the Garamanteans, who always went to battle with his right arm bare. (See _Don Quixote_, I. iii. 4; "The _friendless-people's friend_," etc.) Don Quixote is here spoken of, and "_Pentapolin named o' the Naked Arm_" is mentioned by Don Quixote when he sees the two flocks of sheep: "Know, friend Sancho, that yonder army before us is commanded by the Emperor Alifanfaron, sovereign of the Island of Trapoban; and the other is commanded by his enemy the king of the Garamanteans, known by the name of Pentapolin with the naked arm, because he always engages in battle with the right arm bare." l. 12, _Verona_: a city of North Italy, on the Adige, under the Lombard Alps. l. 66, "_The thunder phrase of the Athenian_," etc.: Æschylus, who fought at Marathon. l. 70, "_The starry paladin_": Sir Philip Sidney's love poems to Stella were written under the _nom de plume_ of Astrophel (the lover of the star). [S.] l. 80, _The Second Friedrich_ == Holy Roman Emperor (1194-1250), surnamed _the Hohenstauffen_, the most remarkable historic figure of the middle ages. He was the grandson of Barbarossa, and was crowned in 1220. l. 81, _Third Honorius_ == Pope Honorius III. (1216-1227): he was a Guelf. l. 104, _Richard of St. Boniface_, Count of Verona, was of the Guelfs; _Lombard League_: the famous alliance of the great Lombard cities began in 1164. l. 117, "_Prone is the purple pavis_": a pavise is a large shield covering the whole body: when the shield was _prone_--_i.e._ fallen flat on its face--its owner was defenceless. l. 124, "_Duke o' the Rood_": of the Order of the Holy Cross. l. 126, _Hell-cat_ == Eccelin. l. 131, _Ferrara_: an ancient city of North Italy, twenty-nine miles from Bologna and seventy from Venice. l. 131, _Osprey_: a long-winged eagle. "An osprey appears to have been the coat of arms of Salinguerra, as the 'ostrich with a horseshoe in his beak' was that of Eccelin." [S.] l. 142, _Oliero_: the monastery which Eccelin the monk entered. It is situated near Bassano, in the Eastern Alps. ll. 148 and 149, _Cino Bocchimpane_ and _Buccio Virtù_: citizens. l. 149, _God's Wafer_: an oath (Ostia di Dio). l. 150, "_Tutti Santi_" == "All Saints!" an exclamation. l. 153, _Padua_: a famous city of Lombardy, said to be the oldest in North Italy; _Podesta_ == governor of a city. l. 197, _Hohenstauffen_: this dynasty of Germany began with Conrad III. (1137-52). Frederick II. was the most illustrious man of this illustrious family. l. 198, _John of Brienne_: crusader and titular king of Jerusalem (1204). He was afterwards Emperor of the East. His daughter Yolande or Iolanthe married Frederick II. l. 201, _Otho IV._, Holy Roman Emperor (_c._ 1174-1218). l. 202, _Barbaross_ == Frederick Barbarossa: one of the greatest sovereigns of Germany (1152-90). There is a German tradition that he is not dead, but only sleeping, and that when he starts from his slumbers a golden age will begin for Germany. l. 205, _Triple-bearded Teuton_ Barbarossa: the legend runs that his beard has already grown through the table slab, but must wind itself thrice round the table before his second advent. l. 253, _Trevisan_: of the province of Treviso; its chief town, Treviso, is distant seventeen miles from Venice. l. 257, _Godego_: a town in Venetia, amongst the Asolan hills. _Marostica_: a town of North Italy, fifteen miles north-east of Vicenza, at the foot of Mount Rovero. l. 258, _Castiglione_: a town at the Italian end of the Lago di Garda (Cartiglion in the text, but evidently a misprint); _Bassano_: a city of Italy, in the province of Vicenza, on the Brenta. In the centre of the town is the Tower of Ezzelino. _Loria_, or Lauria: a city of Italy in the province of Potenza. The castle was the birthplace of Ruggiero di Loria. l. 259, _Suabian_: the struggle for the Imperial throne between Philip of Swabia and Otto of Brunswick (1198-1208) enlisted the sympathies of Italy, and some of the Guelfic towns took the part of the Guelf Otto. l. 262, _Vale of Trent_: Trent or Tridentum was once the wealthiest town in Tyrol; it lies between Botzen and Verona. l. 263, _Roncaglia_, near Piacenza, where Frederick I. held the Diet in 1154, and received the submission of the Lombards. l. 265, _Asolan and Euganean hills_: in the Trevisan, a district of North Italy, between Trent and Venice. l. 266, _Rhetian_, of the country of the Tyrol and the Grisons; _Julian_ mountains: between Venetia and Noricum. l. 288, _Romano_: Eccelino da Romano. l. 304, _Rovigo_: a city of Italy, about twenty-seven miles S.S.W. of Padua. From the eleventh to the fourteenth century the Este family was usually in authority. l. 305, _Ancona's March_: the frontier or boundary of Ancona, a city of Central Italy on the Adriatic. l. 315, _Hildebrand_: Pope Gregory VII. (1073-85). l. 317, _Twenty-four_: the magistrates of Verona who managed the affairs of the city. l. 324, _Carroch_, or _caroccio_: a Lombard war carriage, which was drawn by oxen, and bore a great bell, the standard of the army, and the Sacred Host, forming a rallying point. l. 373, "_John's transcendent vision_"--Book of Revelation. ll. 382 and 385, _Mantua_ and _Mincio_: about seven hundred years ago the river Mincio formed a great marsh round the city of Mantua; this separated the city from the mountains, on the slope of which stood the castle of Goïto. l. 420, _Caryatides_: figures of women serving to support entablatures. l. 587, "_That Pisan Pair_": Niccolo Pisano, and Giovanni Pisano, his son were great sculptors and architects of Pisa (_circ._ 1207-78). "Nicolo was born about 1200, and was one of the first to seek after the truer forms of art in the general quickening of the century. He was a great sculptor, as his works and those of his son Giovanni (architect of the Campo Santo at Pisa) and his school bear witness at Pisa, Orvieto, Pistoia, and many other towns. After he had met with an example of the genuine antique--a sarcophagus now at Pisa--he brought his future work into accordance with its rules." [S.] l. 589, "_while at Sienna is Guidone set_": "The name Guido da Sienna and the date 1221, mark a picture now at Sienna; and this, with other works attributed to the same painter, show him to have been one of the earliest artists who express a feeling independent of Byzantine influence." [S.] l. 591, "_Saint Euphemia_": a fine brick church at Verona, dating from the thirteenth century. The interior has now been entirely remodelled. [S.]. _Saint Eufemia_: of Chalcedon: her body was said to have been miraculously conveyed to Rovigno, in the sixth century. l. 606, "_so they found at Babylon_": "It is said that after the city (of Seleucia) was burnt, the soldiers searching the temple (of Apollo) found a narrow hole, and when this was opened in the hope of finding something of value in it, there issued from some deep gulf, which the secret magic of the Chaldeans had closed up, a pestilence laden with the strength of incurable disease, which polluted the whole world with contagion, in the time of Verus and Marcus Antoninus, and from the borders of Persia to Gaul and the Rhine."--Ammianus Marcellinus. [S.] l. 607, "_Colleagues, mad Lucius and sage Antonine_": during the joint reign of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (the philosopher) and the scapegrace Lucius Verus; the latter was in command of the Roman forces in the east, and engaged in a war with Parthia. His generals sacked Seleucia, and he was himself present in the neighbourhood of Babylon during the winters of A.D. 163-5 (_v._ Clinton, _Fasti Romani_). [S.] l. 608, "_Apollo's shrine_": "Seleuceus, one of Alexander's generals, and himself a Macedonian, founded the Syrian empire, and built the town of Seleucia. A good deal is told of the Hellenization of the East under Seleucus. He, no doubt, founded the temple of Apollo, who was claimed as an ancestor of the family." [S.] l. 617, _Loxian_: surname of Apollo. l. 671, _Orpine_: a yellow plant, commonly called _Livelong_ (Sedum Telephium). l. 679, "_adventurous spider_": the geometric spiders (Orbitelariæ), are almost the only ones whose method of forming a snare have been at all minutely recorded. The garden spider (Epeira) spins a large quantity of thread, which, floating in the air in various directions, happens, from its glutinous quality, at last to adhere to some object near it--a lofty plant, or the branch of a tree. When the spider has one end of the line fixed, he walks along part of it, and fastens another, then drops and affixes the thread to some object below; climbs again, and begins a third, fastening that in a similar way. Mr. Browning is in error when he makes the spider shoot her threads from depth to height, from barbican to battlement. l. 707, "_eat fern seed_": this was anciently supposed to make the eater invisible; _Naddo_: appears as Sordello's friend and adviser: Mr. Browning makes him a representative of the "Philistine" party, and puts into his mouth the words of mere conventional, superficial wisdom. l. 720, "_Poppy--a coarse brown rattling crane_": the cranium or skull-like poppy head, when it contains the seed and is dry. l. 784, _Valvassor_, or _vavasour_: in feudal law a principal vassal, not holding immediately of the sovereign, but of a great lord; _suzerain_: a feudal lord, a lord paramount. l. 835, "_The Guelfs paid stabbers, etc._": "In 1209 Otho IV. entered Italy, and held his court near Verona. All the chief lords of Venetia, but especially Eccelino II., da Romana, and Azzo VI., Marquis d'Este, were summoned to attend. Those two gentlemen had profited by the long interregnum which preceded Otho's reign. They had used the various discords between the towns to increase each his own faction; and the hatred between the two was more bitter than ever. A dramatic scene took place at the meeting before the Emperor. When Eccelino saw Azzo, he said, in the presence of the whole court, 'We were intimate in our youth, and I believed him to be my friend. One day we were in Venice together, walking on the Place of St. Mark, when his assassins flung themselves upon me to stab me; and at the same moment the Marquis seized my arms, to prevent me from defending myself; and if I had not by a violent effort escaped, I should have been killed, as was one of my soldiers by my side. I denounce him, therefore, before this assembly as a traitor; and of you, Sire, I demand permission to prove by a single combat his treachery to me as well as to Salinguerra, and to the podesta of Vicenza.' Shortly afterwards, Salinguerra arrived, followed by a hundred men at arms, and throwing himself at the feet of the Emperor, he made a similar accusation against the Marquis, and also demanded the ordeal of battle. Azzo replied to him, that he had on his hands plenty of gentlemen more noble than Salinguerra ready to fight for him if he was so anxious for battle. Then Otho commanded all three to be silent, and declared that he should not accord to any of them the privilege of fighting for any of their past quarrels. From these two chiefs the Emperor expected greater service than from all other Italians; and he secured their allegiance by confirming the lordship of the Marches of Ancona upon the Marquis, and by declaring Eccelino to be imperial deputy and permanent podesta of Vicenza." [S.] Line 857, _Malek_, a Moor. l. 885, _Miramoline_: a Saracen prince, whose territory was situated in North Africa: in the year 1214, St. Francis of Assisi set out for Morocco to preach the gospel to this famous Mahometan, but was taken seriously ill on the way. l. 888, "_dates plucked from the bough John Brienne sent_": he sent a bunch of dates to remind Frederick of his promise to join the crusade. l. 924, _crenelled_: embattled, crenellated. l. 935, _Damsel-fly_: the dragon-fly, so called from its elegant appearance. l. 946, _Python_: a monstrous serpent which haunted the caves of Parnassus, and was slain by Apollo. l. 950, "_Girls--his Delians_": at the island of Delos the festival of Apollo was celebrated. The girls were priestesses of Apollo. l. 956, "_Daphne and Apollo_": Daphne was a nymph who, being pursued by Apollo, was at her own entreaty changed into a bay tree--the tree consecrated to Apollo. l. 1008, _Trouvères_ == troubadours.